This is the moment everything has led up to. This is what the Signless has spent three miserable years biding his time to be alive to see. He's kept his head down and kept his mouth shut and pushed all his pain into the attic of his mind to wait -- to wait for what?

Alternia is there, he knows, just a few steps into that whirling vortex. He used to think he'd go back in a heartbeat if he had the choice. There was work in his world still to be done. He knows that if he goes back, he dies, and his death will be instrumental in shaping the future toward the course it's meant to take. In that way staying is selfish, but he came to terms with that years ago. That part of himself is dead, has died slowly piece by piece the longer he's been here and the longer he's given himself to this cause and these people. His work here isn't done, and that means walking through that portal now would be just as selfish as staying. The rebellion still needs him. Twelve still needs him. All his friends, all his loves, all the people bound to him simply by this shared experience -- they all need him. This chain, right now, needs him.

He takes Luna's hand, grips it hard. She's not one of the ones he knows, but that hardly matters. They've all been brought together by this one goal; everything else has been pushed to the wayside. It puts a fire in his chest that hasn't really been lit there in years. The embers have been there, barely glowing, but here he's found himself again. This is what he was meant for. He gives her an encouraging nod, his eyes brighter with the light of the portal and some internal glow, and then turns.

"Come on," he says to whoever's nearest him. "It's working. We can do this."